This Chore Can Make or Break Your Weight Loss Goals

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The beginning of a new year can offer a fresh start after the gluttony of the holidays. If you’re committing to some healthy new habits, set yourself up for success by clearing out the clutter in your kitchen. Research shows that how you set up your kitchen can go a long way toward supporting a healthy weight.

The goal for the following kitchen purge is twofold: toss anything that’s past its prime (to reduce your risk of foodborne illness), and restock with all the healthy ingredients you’ll need for a cleaner, leaner 2016. Ready? Here’s what to do.

Freezer

First toss the following: anything with a bad case of freezer burn or items that are basically encrusted with frost; anything not labeled that you don’t recognize, and foods you bought on a whim that you really don’t need in your life. (Looking at you “diet-friendly” ice cream bars.)

Next, start checking dates on things that are marked. Leftovers are only good for about three months, uncooked chicken about nine months, and ground turkey three to four months. Also be sure to check out the dates on any pre-packaged foods, like frozen dinners–they do expire.

RELATED: 32 Ways to Reverse Holiday Weight Gain in 1 Week

Stock up on

Load up on frozen produce where the only ingredient is the veggie or fruit, like frozen broccoli and berries. You can steam veggies to toss with a little pesto or tapenade, and whip both veggies and fruits into smoothies. Add frozen whole grains to your grocery list, too. These days you can find bags of pre-cooked brown rice and quinoa, which you can thaw and add to a salad or heat and eat. For a quick and easy protein look for frozen pre-cooked shrimp. All you need to do is rinse them under cold water to eat chilled, or to thaw for an add-in to a stir fry.

Now is the ideal time to commit to preparing more meals yourself rather than heating up a frozen pizza, and keeping healthy frozen ingredients on hand can serve as major time-saving shortcuts.

Fridge

Sometimes it’s obvious when items in your fridge need to go. But you can’t always rely on your senses to know what’s good, because you can’t see, smell, or even taste some of bacteria in food that can make you sick.

RELATED: 10 Superfoods for Weight Loss

To be safe, you should toss leftovers, uncooked poultry, meat, or seafood, and deli meat after a few days, and check dates on foods like yogurt. Eggs in the shell are good for three to five weeks, but cartons of eggs or egg yolks are only safe to keep for three days after they’re opened.

The keep time for condiments after opening various by product: one month for salsa; two months for pickles, olives, mayo, and salad dressing; three months for barbeque sauce and horseradish; six months for ketchup and jam; and eight for mustard. If you honestly aren’t sure how long something’s been in your fridge opened I say better safe than sorry – get rid of it.

Stock up on

In addition to the obvious items, like fresh whole foods, condiments can be a great way to whip up healthy foods quickly and easily. I already mentioned the pesto or tapenade trick, which also works well for jazzing up lean proteins, like chicken breast or scrambled eggs.

Mustard, especially spicy brown and Dijon, combined with balsamic vinegar (which can keep opened for a year) are my go-tos for a quick and healthy salad dressing. Just add dried Italian herb seasoning to the mix and you’re good to go.

RELATED: 16 Ways to Lose Weight Fast

Tahini is another staple. Typically the only ingredients are ground sesame seeds and a little salt, but you can add more flavor by stirring in a little lemon juice, garlic, and cayenne pepper. It’s awesome as a salad dressing or to drizzle over anything, from cooked veggies to chicken, fish, lentils, and chickpeas, or (if you’re adventurous) stir it into oatmeal.

Two more great condiments: salsa and fermented veggies (think sauerkraut, kimchi and the like). They can also be used to flavor just about anything, from omelets and hard boiled eggs to beans, potatoes, whole grains, lean proteins and raw or cooked greens.

Finally, a must-have for your fridge is a filtering pitcher. Keep it front and center and if you want, toss in flavor infusers, like fresh mint, sliced cucumber, fresh ginger, or any type of in-season fruit.

RELATED: 57 Ways to Lose Weight Forever, According to Science

Cupboards

Some of my clients are shocked to discover that some of the items stashed in their pantry are long past their ‘best if used by dates,’ like almond milk, and whole grains. Even worse is when they don’t know how long something has been stashed after it’s opened, because once a food is exposed to air, light, and humidity, it can degrade fairly quickly. For example, whole grains and olive oil should generally be tossed after six months, nut butters and flours or meals after two to three, and cereals after two to three. If you regularly keep opened goods in your cupboards tack on a sticker or piece of masking tape as soon as you open an item, and grab a sharpie to record the date.

Stock up on

Despite the often-heard advice to shop the perimeter of the grocery store there are some shelf stable items that make healthy additions to your pantry.

One of my favorites is low sodium organic vegetable broth. I use it to sauté or stir fry veggies, and as a base for homemade soups and stews. Other items to keep on hand include: pulses (beans, lentils, and peas), which can be found bagged or canned and in aseptic cartons; canned wild salmon; whole grains (quinoa, wild rice, popcorn, oats, buckwheat soba noodles, etc.); canned pumpkin; nuts and seeds; herbs and spices; good-for-you oils, like olive and sesame; and un-opened condiments.

For less than nutritionally stellar items you keep on hand, either for your family, or as occasional treats for yourself, choose a designated low traffic area and stash them together, away from your “everyday foods.” If you see cookies or chips every time you reach for nuts or spices you’ll wind up getting into them more often. And finally, keep your kitchen surfaces clear, or stock them with only healthy fare, like a bowl or fresh fruit. One recent study found that what you store on your counter tops can have a big impact on your weight: women who had a visible fruit bowl weighed about 13 pounds less than those who stored sugary things like cereals on their counters.

What’s your take on this topic? Chat with us on Twitter by mentioning @goodhealth and @CynthiaSass.

Cynthia Sass is a nutritionist and registered dietitian with master’s degrees in both nutrition science and public health. Frequently seen on national TV, she’s Health’s contributing nutrition editor, and privately counsels clients in New York, Los Angeles, and long distance. Cynthia is currently the sports nutrition consultant to the New York Yankees, previously consulted for three other professional sports teams, and is board certified as a specialist in sports dietetics. Sass is a three-time New York Times best-selling author, and her brand new book is Slim Down Now: Shed Pounds and Inches with Real Food, Real Fast. Connect with her on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.

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New U.S. Dietary Guidelines: Limit Sugar and Salt, Boost Fruit and Veggie Intake

By Dennis Thompson
HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Jan. 7, 2016 (HealthDay News) — Americans need to cut back on added sugars, saturated fats and salt if they want to eat a diet that can improve their health, according to the federal government’s latest version of its Dietary Guidelines.

The guidelines, released Thursday, break new ground by specifically recommending that people limit added sugars to fewer than 10 percent of their daily calories.

The last version of the guidelines, which came out in 2010, only said that people should reduce their intake of added sugars without setting a specific goal. The guidelines are updated every five years, so they keep up with current science.

The new recommendations — called the 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans — also ask that people limit saturated fats to fewer than 10 percent of their daily calories, and consume fewer than 2,300 milligrams per day of salt. That’s a bit less than 1 teaspoon of salt.

Overall, the guidelines emphasize the adoption of a healthy eating pattern that fits into a person’s lifestyle, rather than recommending specific amounts of different foods, such as vegetables or meats.

“These patterns can be tailored to an individual’s personal preferences, enabling Americans to choose the diet that is right for them,” the report states.

The guidelines even provide three examples of a healthy eating plan that people can adopt: a healthy American diet; a Mediterranean-style diet; and a vegetarian diet.

The emphasis on a healthy eating plan is meant to be more consumer-friendly, making it easier for people to use the guidelines, experts said.

“The 2015 dietary guidelines focus on healthy eating habits and less on including or eliminating individual nutrients,” Elisabetta Politi, nutrition director at the Duke University Diet & Fitness Center, said in a university news release. “This is essential, because your whole diet impacts your health and disease risk.

“Americans should be shifting their diets to more plant-based foods like veggies and fruits such as the popular Mediterranean diet, which includes a lot of healthy fats and whole grains,” she added. “The guidelines emphasize the value of making meals and snacks from scratch instead of relying on processed foods. With shortcuts like frozen veggies, or pre-washed and packaged produce, preparing healthy meals for your family really can be easier than most people think.”

According to the new guidelines, a healthy eating pattern includes:

• Any type of vegetables, especially if they’re eaten in a wide variety.
• Fruits, especially whole fruits.
• Grains, at least half of which are whole grains.
• Fat-free or low-fat dairy, including milk, yogurt, cheese, and/or fortified soy beverages.
• A variety of protein sources, including seafood, lean meats and poultry, eggs, beans and peas, nuts and seeds, and soy products.
• Oils.

If alcohol is consumed, it should be done so in moderation — up to one drink a day for women and up to two drinks a day for men, the guidelines say.

“Americans can meet these recommendations by following simple advice: eat more unprocessed foods — especially fruits, vegetables and whole grains — and when removing unwanted sugar and fat from your diet, replace those foods with plant-based foods, including whole grains, fruits and vegetables,” said American College of Cardiology President Dr. Kim Allan Williams, in a prepared statement.

Currently, added sugars account, on average, for more than 13 percent of calories per day in the American diet, the federal report says.

Beverages are the major source of added sugar, accounting for 47 percent of all added sugars consumed by Americans. These include soft drinks, fruit drinks, sweetened coffee and tea, energy drinks, alcoholic beverages and flavored waters, according to the report.

Most other added sugars in the average American diet are found in snacks and sweets (31 percent), although they also can be tucked away in foods like grains (8 percent) and prepared meals (6 percent).

Saturated fats currently make up 11 percent of the calories in a typical U.S. diet, and less than a third of Americans limit their saturated fat intake to the new goal of fewer than 10 percent of daily calories, the guidelines state.

About 35 percent of saturated fats comes from prepared foods, particularly those containing cheese or meat. They include burgers, sandwiches, tacos and pizza. Saturated fats also are found in snacks and sweets, foods high in protein, and dairy products, the report noted.

Dana Angelo White, clinical assistant professor of athletic training and sports medicine at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Conn., said: “I am thrilled to see that these revamped [dietary] guidelines are increasing the emphasis on improving overall eating patterns. These are realistic and attainable goals for Americans to improve their diets and health starting today.”

Following the new guidelines could help stem America’s obesity epidemic, Williams added.

“Very recently there have been indications from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that the growth in obesity is leveling off, but there is still a lot of work to be done to help Americans return to healthier body weight to reduce heart disease and other related health issues,” she said. “Following the recommendations in the 2015-2020 Guidelines to lower intake of cholesterol, fat and sugar, will help improve the health of the American population.”

The Dietary Guidelines also recognize the important role of exercise, and recommend that people meet the federal Physical Activity Guidelines as well. Those guidelines recommend that adults every week engage in 2.5 hours of moderate-intensity aerobic exercise, 1 hour 15 minutes of vigorous-intensity aerobic exercise, or some combination of the two. The activity guidelines also recommend muscle-strengthening activities at least two days a week.

More information

For more on the 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, visit the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

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Regular Mammograms Worthwhile for Elderly Women

THURSDAY, Jan. 7, 2016 (HealthDay News) — Regular mammograms benefit elderly women, a new study indicates.

Previous research has shown that mammography screening reduces breast cancer deaths among women up to age 74, but there is little information about women older than 74, especially minority women, the Florida Atlantic University researchers explained.

They analyzed Medicare data from 1995 to 2009 on more than 4,800 black women and more than 59,000 white women, all of whom were aged 69 or older.

Among women aged 75 to 84, those who had annual mammograms were less likely to die from breast cancer over a 10-year period than those who had irregular or no mammograms.

Breast cancer patients aged 69 to 84 who had annual mammograms in the four years before their diagnosis had lower five- and 10-year death rates than those who had irregular or no mammograms.

Ten-year death rates among women aged 69 to 84 were three times higher among whites and more than two times higher among blacks who had irregular or no mammogram screening, compared with those who had annual mammograms.

The researchers also found that white women who died of breast cancer were more likely to be older, to have been diagnosed at a later stage and to have received chemotherapy. They were also less likely to have had surgery or have undergone radiation therapy.

The study was published Jan. 6 in the American Journal of Medicine.

Breast cancer is the second most common type of cancer in American women, affecting one in eight during their lifetime and killing one in 25. In 2010, 41 percent of breast cancer deaths occurred in women aged 65 to 84.

Regular mammography is recommended for women aged 65 to 74, according to the American Cancer Society and the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force.

More information

The U.S. Office on Women’s Health has more about mammograms.

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High Ozone Levels Dangerous for Critically Ill: Study

THURSDAY, Jan. 7, 2016 (HealthDay News) — Long-term exposure to high levels of ozone may increase the risk of a deadly lung condition among critically ill patients, a new study finds.

Researchers looked at more than 1,500 such patients and found that 563 of them developed acute respiratory disease syndrome (ARDS), a life-threatening inflammatory lung condition in which the lungs can’t obtain sufficient oxygen.

The risk of ARDS rose along with increased long-term ozone exposure, and the risk was highest among trauma patients. The researchers also found that ozone was significantly associated with ARDS in current smokers, but not in nonsmokers.

Ground-level ozone, an air pollutant, is the main ingredient in smog, and is generally created by chemical reactions between certain compounds from sources such as car exhaust, chemical solvents and emissions from industrial plants, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The study was published online Jan. 7 in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.

Previous research has found a link between smoking and ARDS, but this is the first study to associate ozone pollution with the disease. However, the study did not prove that prolonged ozone exposure causes ARDS.

Further research is needed to confirm these findings, and to find ways to reduce ozone exposure and ARDS risk among critically ill patients, Dr. Lorraine Ware, from Vanderbilt University’s School of Medicine in Nashville, Tenn., and colleagues concluded.

There is growing concern about the health threats posed by ozone, suggesting the need to reduce levels of ozone pollution, according to a news release from the journal.

More information

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has more on ozone.

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Organ Recipients at Raised Risk of Cancer Death, Study Finds

By Dennis Thompson
HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Jan. 7, 2016 (HealthDay News) — People who’ve received an organ transplant are almost three times more likely to die from cancer than the general population, a new study reports.

And transplant patients who never had cancer before are nearly twice as likely to die from cancer, the researchers reported.

“We found there was an increased risk of death from almost every cancer,” said lead researcher Dr. Nancy Baxter, chief of general surgery at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto. “That was in all age groups, but more for younger individuals than older individuals. It seems that cancer is a real burden for transplant patients.”

The findings were published in the Jan. 7 online edition of JAMA Oncology.

Cancer was the second-leading cause of death, behind heart disease, for the more than 11,000 transplant patients in the study, Baxter said. The study included information from 1991 to 2010. Transplants included kidneys, livers, hearts and lungs.

There were just over 3,000 deaths in that group, including about 600 related to cancer, the researchers said.

Physicians have been aware that transplant patients are more likely to get cancer, Baxter said, but it wasn’t known whether these patients are at greater risk of actually dying from their cancer.

“We haven’t known the impact that cancer has on them, because they have a lot of other things going on as well that can affect their health,” explained Baxter, who is also an associate professor at the University of Toronto’s Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation.

People who’ve had a transplant are nearly 30 times more likely to die from non-melanoma skin cancers, the study found. In addition, people who’ve had a transplant are almost 13 times more likely to die from liver cancer, and nearly 10 times more likely to die from non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The risk of dying from bone or soft tissue cancer was about five times higher, the research revealed.

The risk of cancer death in pediatric transplant patients was about 85 times higher than their peers. Transplant recipients older than 60 had the lowest risk of cancer death in the study, but even that was nearly double their peer rate, the investigators found.

Experts believe the immune-suppressing drugs that transplant patients need to prevent rejection of new organs may work against them when it comes to cancer, allowing cancers to grow, Baxter said.

“Our immune system helps us fight cancer. It helps fight off some malignancies,” Baxter said. “If you have that dampened down, it may have an impact.”

Immune system-suppressing drugs also might hamper the body’s ability to target and kill off viruses that cause cancer, Baxter added. For example, human papillomavirus (HPV) can cause cervical cancer, Epstein-Barr virus is linked to lymphoma, and hepatitis B and C viruses can lead to liver cancer, the researchers said.

In this study, people were 6.5 times more likely to die from a cancer caused by an infectious disease, but only twice as likely to die from a cancer not caused by an infection.

Transplant patients also might die because they aren’t hardy enough to handle the cancer treatment that a healthy person can take, Baxter suggested.

“They’ve got a lot going on in terms of their transplants, they’re on a lot of medications, and they may not tolerate the kind of aggressive treatment we give for cancer that the average person gets,” she said.

However, the cancer risk is not a reason to turn down a transplant, said Dr. Thomas Schiano, medical director of liver transplant for Mount Sinai Health System in New York City.

“The article shouldn’t scare patients into avoiding life-saving transplantation or induce them to stop their immunosuppression,” Schiano said. “They should work with their transplant team to establish specifics regarding cancer screening, i.e., seeing a dermatologist annually for skin cancer screening,” he explained.

“What I have found over the years is that transplant recipients may not undergo American Cancer Society screening guidelines because they get lost in the shuffle,” added Schiano, who was not involved with the new study.

“The transplant team only sees them annually and their internists may forget about cancer screening in the setting of the complex post-transplant management, or the patient doesn’t give the significance to it,” he said.

Baxter added that there also are lifestyle changes that transplant patients can undertake to improve their odds.

For example, she pointed out that in the study more people overall died from lung cancer than any other type of cancer.

“Getting these people to stop smoking is really important, and now that there’s lung cancer screening we need to really focus on that as well,” she said.

More information

For more on organ transplantation, visit the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

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Exercise to Boost Spine Muscles Can Ease Back Pain, Study Suggests

THURSDAY, Jan. 7, 2016 (HealthDay News) — An exercise program meant to boost coordination of muscles that control and support the spine can help reduce lower back pain, a new study suggests.

This type of program — called motor control exercise — begins with patients practicing normal use of these muscles by doing simple tasks, usually with guidance from a therapist or expert. The exercises gradually become more demanding and include activities that patients typically do during work or recreation.

Researchers analyzed data from 29 clinical trials that included more than 2,400 people, aged 22 to 55, with lower back pain. The trials compared the effectiveness of motor control exercise with other types of exercise or with doing nothing.

Patients who did motor control exercise showed greater improvement, with less pain and disability, than those who did nothing. When comparing motor control exercise and other types of exercise after three to 12 months, similar improvements in the motor control group were seen.

The study was published Jan. 7 in the Cochrane Library.

“Targeting the strength and coordination of muscles that support the spine through motor control exercise offers an alternative approach to treating lower back pain,” said lead author Bruno Saragiotto, a physiotherapist at the George Institute at the University of Sydney in Australia.

“We can be confident that they are as effective as other types of exercise, so the choice of exercise should take into account factors such as patient or therapist preferences, cost and availability,” he said in a journal news release.

“At present, we don’t really know how motor control exercise compares with other forms of exercise in the long term. It’s important we see more research in this field so that patients can make more informed choices about persisting with treatment,” he added.

More information

The American Academy of Family Physicians has more about low back pain.

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Cancer Death Rates Down 23 Percent Since 1991: Study

By Kathleen Doheny
HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Jan. 7, 2016 (HealthDay News) — Deaths from cancer continue to decline in the United States, according to a new report from the American Cancer Society.

Since peaking in 1991, cancer death rates have dropped by 23 percent, the ACS said in the report released Thursday.

“Cancer death rates are continuing to decline by about 1.5 percent per year,” said study author Rebecca Siegel, strategic director for surveillance information services for the American Cancer Society. The 23 percent drop in death rates occurred from 1991 through 2012, she said, and that translates to more than 1.7 million cancer deaths averted.

“We are doing very well, I would say, is the bottom line,” she said.

The findings are included in Cancer Statistics, 2016, the American Cancer Society’s latest annual report on cancer incidence, mortality and survival. The report was published online Jan. 7 in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians.

The data was collected from the U.S. National Cancer Institute’s Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) program and other sources. Over the past decade, the rate of cancer deaths has dropped by 1.8 percent a year in men and 1.4 percent in women, according to the report. The decline in the past 20 years has been driven by the continuous drop in deaths for four major cancer types: breast, colon, lung and prostate, the report noted.

For 2016, the ACS estimates that there will be about 1.6 million new cancer cases and nearly 600,000 deaths in the United States.

Despite the progress, death rates for certain cancers are increasing, Siegel and her colleagues found. These include cancers of the liver, pancreas and uterus. Thyroid cancers are the most rapidly rising, increasing more than 5 percent yearly in both men and women, the research revealed. However, some of that increase stems from overdiagnosis due to advanced imaging techniques, the experts said.

The decline in cancer deaths is due to early detection and treatment advances, along with fewer people smoking, Siegel said.

Dr. Steven Rosen is director of the City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center and Beckman Research Institute in Duarte, Calif. While saying “there was nothing surprising” in the new report, he added that “we should be very proud of all our accomplishments.”

However, he said, more work needs to be done. For instance, obesity, which is linked with many cancers, must be addressed, he said.

“It’s felt that obesity will replace tobacco as the number one cause of cancer. We have to be diligent,” Rosen cautioned.

Among the cancers that may be linked to obesity are breast, colon, endometrial, esophagus, gallbladder, kidney, pancreas, prostate and thyroid, he said.

Siegel agreed that obesity must be addressed head-on as a cancer risk factor. “For many of the cancers that are increasing, it’s related to obesity,” she said. The link between obesity and cancer is not well-known by many people, she added.

Smoking rates must also decline further, Siegel said. “We still have 17 percent of Americans who are smoking.”

Rosen offered some final advice on cancer prevention.

“Eat a healthy diet, exercise, try to be as close as possible to your ideal body weight. Don’t smoke, drink in moderation, and minimize sun exposure,” he advised.

More information

To learn more about cancer prevention, visit the American Cancer Society.

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Target Pairs Up With SoulCycle for Capsule Collection and Popup Series

Big news, Target shoppers: This morning, the brand announced a new collaboration with the luxury spin studio SoulCycle. They will offer complimentary classes in 10 cities, as well as an exclusive SoulCycle x Target design capsule.

Items in the capsule collection feature both the signature SoulCycle wheel as well as Target’s red bullseye. At less than $50 apiece, the clothing in this line—which include sweatshirts, tank tops, tees, and sweat pants—cost about half of what typical SoulCycle apparel goes for.

RELATED: Bike Your Way to a Better Body

The free SoulCycle classes (they usually run $34) will be held during three-day pop-up series: in Houston, Seattle, and Washington D.C. (Jan. 22-24); Atlanta, Denver, and Nashville (Jan. 29-31); Miami and Chicago (Feb. 5-7); and Minneapolis and Los Angeles (Feb. 12-14). Each tour will host six classes per day in various venues, and sign ups for the classes begin at 3 p.m. on the Friday before the series beings. A few Target stores in the selected cities will also feature pop-up shops for wellness products.

If SoulCycle isn’t riding through one of your cities, you can still swipe up some of the gear at Target. But hurry, sizes are selling out quickly!

($29; Target.com)

($49; Target.com)

($49; Target.com)

($29; Target.com)

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The U.S. Food Guidelines Have Always Been Controversial

Photo: Getty Images

Today, the new 2015 Dietary Guidelines were released, recommending Americans eat more fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and varied proteins. This year’s guidelines were the subject of much controversy, including arguments over whether issues like sustainability should be included in recommendations for how Americans eat. The new guidelines did not recommend limits on processed or red meat.

But quarreling isn’t unusual when it comes to American diet recommendations. The guidelines as we know them today—released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) every five years—started from a disagreement.

RELATED: The 50 (New) Healthiest Foods—With Recipes

In 1977, the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs, led by Senator George McGovern, recommended “Dietary Goals” for the American people: consume only as much energy as you expend, eat more naturally occurring sugars, consume more fruits and vegetables and go easy on eggs and butter. The Dietary Goals received backlash from both industry and the science community over whether they were supported by enough evidence.

From that backlash emerged a decision to have the USDA and HHS partner. They selected scientists from both departments and created what would become the 1980 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, which recommended seven ways to have a good diet, including eating a variety of foods, avoiding too much fat and cholesterol and cutting down on sugar. But once again, the development approach and the guidelines themselves were criticized.

Ultimately, the HHS and USDA were directed to form an advisory committee that would make sure outside advice would be included in future guidelines. A Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee was formed and used for the first time in the creation of the 1985 guidelines. This time, the advice was better received.

RELATED: The War On Delicious

Even before diet guidelines were officially released in the way they are now, federal agencies have long recommended ways for Americans to be better eaters. As TIME reported in 1964, a federal Food and Nutrition Board recommended that an American man and woman cut 300 and 200 calories out of their daily diet, respectively. “The affluent life in the U.S. of the 1960s is also the sweet life, the fat life and the soft life—or so the top U.S. experts have decided,” TIME wrote, adding that “the difference is the caloric content of two average martinis.”

Through the years, diet recommendations in the U.S. have moved away from recommending specific nutrients and more toward food-based recommendations. Even the contentious guidelines released in 1977 marked a shift that focused more on avoiding foods linked to chronic disease. In recent years, there has been significant debate about whether cutting out fat should continue to be a focus (the 2010 guidelines recommend fat-free and low-fat dairy products), and whether cholesterol is still a nutrient of concern.

“Unfortunately, what has remained consistent over the years is that Americans have not followed Dietary Guidelines recommendations,” representatives from the Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion at the USDA told TIME in statement. The agency says the Healthy Eating Index (HEI) was created to measure how closely Americans’ diets fall in line with the Dietary Guidelines, and Americans’ HEI score on a 100 point scale has been between 49 and 58 since the 1990s.

With emerging science—processed meat was recently declared carcinogenic—and bickering among industry and the science community, it’s not hard to see how eating healthy can be confusing.

The key recommendations in this year’s guidelines to eat more fruits and vegetables remains advice worth following. As for the rest? Do as Americans always have, and join in the quarreling.

This article originally appeared on Time.com.

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Mexico’s Soda Tax Linked to Reduced Consumption

THURSDAY, Jan. 7, 2016 (HealthDay News) — A tax on sugary drinks in Mexico may have led to a significant decrease in sales of the beverages, a new study says.

And that might have implications for the fight against obesity.

The 10 percent sales tax was introduced Jan. 1, 2014. One year later, sales of sugary drinks were down 12 percent while sales of untaxed beverages — mainly bottled water — were up 4 percent, according to the study published Jan. 6 in the journal BMJ.

The short-term impact of taxing sugary drinks appears to be “moderate but important,” said study author Shu Wen Ng, a research associate professor in the department of nutrition at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and colleagues. Further monitoring is required “to understand purchases longer term, potential substitutions, and health implications,” they said in a journal news release.

Their analysis of data from more than 6,200 Mexican households in 53 large cities showed that, in 2014, the average person bought 4.2 fewer liters of sugary drinks than they would have before the tax.

The reduction in sales of sugary drinks was highest among poor households, falling 17 percent by the end of 2014, according to the study.

But because this was an observational study, the researchers said no definitive conclusions can be drawn about cause and effect.

Mexico has high levels of diabetes, overweight and obesity, and curbing sugar consumption has been an important target for health advocates, the study authors noted.

While taxes on sugary drinks and other unhealthy products might help in the fight against obesity, they are not a “magic bullet,” said Franco Sassi, senior health economist at the Paris-based Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development.

Such taxes need to be used in conjunction with other policies, such as government regulation, public education about nutrition, and incentives for research and development in food production, Sassi wrote in an accompanying journal editorial.

In a statement released Thursday, the American Heart Association said: “Scientific research shows that overconsumption of added sugars contribute to heart disease and other chronic diseases such as obesity and diabetes. Mexico has paved the way for other nations to decrease sugary drink intake and has shown sugar-sweetened beverage taxes are an effective strategy to make healthy choices easier.

“Reducing consumption as part of a heart-healthy lifestyle will help improve rates of obesity, diabetes, dental caries, and heart disease,” the statement said.

More information

The U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute has more about overweight/obesity prevention.

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